“Space Invasion” – Prairie Rattlesnake (Mottled Acid Patina)

Commissioned work frequently gives me the opportunity to study creatures often much maligned. This piece began as a request from The Wildlife Experience Museum in Parker, Colorado! Rattlesnakes fill a 3.5 million year old niche in nature, keeping rodent populations in check. They, in turn, are food for hawks, eagles, ravens, roadrunners, kingsnakes, bullsnakes, badgers, coyotes, bobcats, alligators and bullfrogs! But humans remain their greatest threat.

Description

Rattlesnakes are truly fascinating creatures and the most recently evolved of the world’s snakes, coming only from the western hemisphere (mainly North America).

Someone once said to me, “Anything you can draw, a snake can do.” – direct observation has proven this true. 150 to 430+ vertebrae (we humans have only 33!), each vertebra having a pair of ribs coming off with up to 24 muscles attached, creates amazing flexibility- for the snake AND the artist! A snake can retract its body, turn and fold practically in half, but cannot crawl backwards, so always allow them an escape route!

“Space Invasion” has juried into two prestigious and exclusive U.S. and Canadian wildlife art shows: The 2009 Society of Animal Artists “Small Works Show“, held at The Wildlife Experience Museum in Parker (Denver), Colorado, and the 2010 Artists For Conservation Foundation’s annual show, “The Art of Conservation, held in Vancouver, British Columbia.

This piece has been placed in 2 Public Art spaces. The original snake was done as a woodcarving, with the intent that it would be produced as a commissioned bronze work for The Wildlife Experience Museum in Parker (Denver), Colorado. Despite their extensive bronze collection, I was, at the time, the first and only artist that they had ever commissioned to do a piece especially for them. This piece was placed on their outdoors Sculpture Walk.
The 2nd of this edition was purchased by Na ‘Aina Kai Sculpture and Botanical Gardens on Kauai, Hawaii, as part of their Native American Navajo Village, and placed on their red-rock escarpment.